Potato Doughs and Breads

Cooking Skills: Potatoes 2

Chapter 2 · Potato Doughs and Breads

Skill goal

Make soft breads and flatbreads using mashed potato as an ingredient.

The basics

Potato makes dough soft. The starch holds on to moisture, so potato breads stay tender and fresh for longer than plain ones. Two kinds of dough are in this chapter: potato dough without yeast (farls and lefse, cooked on a pan) and yeast dough with mash added (focaccia and rolls, baked).

Bread	Potato amount	Raising	Cooked
Farls	Mostly potato	None	Dry pan
Lefse-style	Mostly potato	None	Dry pan, very thin
Focaccia	About 25% of the flour weight	Yeast	Oven
Rolls	About 25% of the flour weight	Yeast	Oven

Dry, plain mash. No milk or butter in the potato itself; add them to the dough.
Floury potatoes give the lightest results.
Handle yeast-free doughs lightly. They have little gluten, so overworking makes them tough.
Flour your surface generously for lefse and farls.

Try it

Level 1 · Start here

Potato farls

30 minutes2 portions (4 farls)a dough with no yeast, cooked on a pan

Farls are triangles of potato dough cooked in a dry pan. The dough is mostly potato, so it is soft and must be handled lightly.

Ingredients (2 portions)

250 g floury potatoes, peeled, boiled, steam-dried and mashed smooth (about 200 g mash)
15 g butter, melted
½ tsp salt
60 g plain flour, plus more for rolling
1 tsp oil, for the pan

While the mash is still warm, mix in the melted butter and salt. Add the flour and work it in with your hands until you have a soft, not sticky, dough. Don't over-knead.
On a floured surface, pat or roll into a round about 18 cm across and 1 cm thick. Cut into 4 triangles (farls).
Heat a non-stick or lightly oiled frying pan over a medium heat. Cook the farls for 3 to 4 minutes a side, until golden brown and speckled.
Eat hot with butter, or fry in a little oil alongside eggs and mushrooms.

Use the mash fresh

Leftover cold mash works too, but it needs a little more flour. Warm mash gives the softest dough.

Level 2 · Thin

Lefse-style flatbreads

50 minutes plus chilling2 to 3 portions (4 flatbreads)rolled paper-thin

A Norwegian-style flatbread: potato dough rolled very thin and cooked briefly on a dry pan. Soft, flexible, and good rolled with butter and sugar or used as a wrap.

Ingredients (3 portions)

250 g floury potatoes, peeled, boiled, riced or mashed very smooth (about 200 g mash)
1 tbsp butter, melted
1 tbsp single cream or milk
½ tsp salt
110 g plain flour, plus plenty for rolling
1 tbsp butter, to serve
1 tsp sugar and cinnamon, mixed, to serve

Mix the warm, very smooth mash with the butter, cream and salt. Spread on a plate and let it cool completely, then chill for 1 hour.
Mix in the flour with your hands until just combined: the dough should be soft and slightly sticky. Divide into 4 balls.
Roll each ball out on a well-floured surface as thin as you can, to a round about 20 cm across and 2 to 3 mm thick. Keep dusting with flour.
Heat a dry non-stick frying pan over a medium-high heat. Cook each flatbread for 1 to 2 minutes a side, until pale with brown spots. Stack under a clean tea towel to keep them soft.
Spread with the butter and sprinkle with the cinnamon sugar, then roll up.

Level 3 · Yeast

Potato focaccia

3 hours (mostly rising)6 portionsplain mash makes a moist, soft crumb

Mashed potato in the dough keeps the crumb soft and moist for longer. This is a wet, sticky dough. Use oiled hands and a spoon instead of kneading.

Ingredients (6 portions)

300 g strong white bread flour
100 g plain mashed potato, cooked and cooled (no milk or butter)
7 g sachet fast-action dried yeast
2 tsp fine salt
250 ml lukewarm water (no hotter than 37°C)
4 tbsp olive oil, divided
1 tsp flaky salt
2 rosemary sprigs

Mix the flour, yeast and fine salt in a large bowl. Add the mash, water and 1 tablespoon of oil and mix with a wooden spoon, then with wet hands, until it forms a very sticky dough. Cover and leave for 1 hour in a warm place, until doubled.
Oil a 20 x 30 cm baking tin with 1 tablespoon of oil. Tip in the dough, fold it over itself a few times in the tin, and stretch it gently to the corners (rest it for 10 minutes if it springs back).
Leave to rise for another 45 minutes. Heat the oven to 200°C fan (220°C conventional, gas 7).
Oil your fingers and dimple the dough all over, pressing right to the bottom. Drizzle with the remaining oil and scatter over the flaky salt and rosemary.
Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until golden. Cool in the tin for 5 minutes, then on a wire rack.

Yeast basics

Water that is too hot kills yeast, so use lukewarm water (it should feel barely warm on your wrist). A fuller account of bread is in the planned bread course.

Level 3 · Yeast

Soft potato rolls

2 hours 30 minutes8 rollslight, soft and slow to go stale

A classic soft roll, shaped by hand. The potato makes the crumb fluffy.

Ingredients (8 portions)

300 g strong white bread flour, plus more for dusting
100 g plain mashed potato, cooled
7 g sachet fast-action dried yeast
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp fine salt
150 ml lukewarm milk
20 g butter, softened
1 tbsp milk, for brushing

Mix the flour, yeast, sugar and salt in a bowl. Add the mash, milk and butter and mix to a soft dough. Knead on a floured surface for 8 to 10 minutes, until smooth and elastic (it will be tacky; add a little flour if too sticky).
Put in an oiled bowl, cover and leave for 1 hour until doubled.
Divide into 8 pieces (about 80 g each). Shape each into a smooth ball by tucking the edges underneath. Place on a lined tray, well spaced.
Cover and leave for 30 to 40 minutes until puffy. Heat the oven to 190°C fan (210°C conventional, gas 6 to 7).
Brush with milk and bake for 18 to 20 minutes, until golden and hollow-sounding when tapped underneath. Cool on a rack.

Experiments

Experiment

Mash amount

How much potato?

Make three small batches of roll dough with 0, 50 g and 100 g of mash per 300 g of flour, adjusting the liquid as needed.
Bake together and compare the crumb and how it feels the next day.

Look for: The no-potato rolls are denser and go stale sooner. The potato rolls are softer and stay soft. Too much potato makes the dough sticky and heavy.

Experiment

Floury or waxy

Check the type.

Make farls with floury potato and with waxy potato, and cook both.
Compare the texture.

Look for: The floury farls are light and soft, the waxy ones are dense and sticky.

Experiment

Resting the lefse

Does chilling matter?

Roll one lefse dough straight after mixing, and another after a 1 hour chill.
Compare how easy it is to roll.

Look for: The warm dough is very sticky and tears. The chilled dough rolls thin.

Experiment

Griddle or oven

Cook the farls two ways.

Cook half the farls on a dry pan and half in a 200°C fan oven for 15 minutes, turning once.
Compare crust and crumb.

Look for: The pan gives a speckled, chewy crust. The oven is paler and drier.

Tasting notes

What I tried	Method or amount	What I saw	What I thought	Will I do it again?
Potato farls
Lefse-style flatbreads
Potato focaccia
Soft rolls
Mash amount
Floury vs waxy
Rested lefse
Pan vs oven farls

Troubleshooting

Problem	Likely cause	What to do
Sticky farl dough	Wet mash	Steam-dry the potatoes; add flour a spoonful at a time
Tough farls	Overworked	Mix until just together
Lefse tears	Dough warm or too thick	Chill it; flour well; roll thin and gently
Dense rolls	Not risen enough, or too much potato	Give them time; use 100 g of mash to 300 g flour
Focaccia flat	Yeast dead (too hot water) or not risen	Use lukewarm water; give it time
Pale crust	Oven cool	Bake hotter, or on a hot tray

Food safety: dough, yeast and storage

Raw flour: the Food Standards Agency advises against eating or tasting uncooked flour or dough, because raw flour is not treated to kill bacteria such as E. coli. Wash your hands, the board and your tools after handling raw dough or raw egg, and use Lion-marked eggs. Cook everything thoroughly. Pregnant women, children under 5, people aged 65 and over, and anyone with a weakened immune system should be especially careful. Don't taste the raw dough.

Raw potatoes: keep them somewhere cool, dark and dry (above about 6°C), not in the fridge and not in the light. The Food Standards Agency advises against keeping raw potatoes in the fridge if you will roast or fry them, because the cold raises the amount of acrylamide that forms when they brown. Cut away sprouts and any green patches generously; if a potato is green all over, or tastes bitter, throw it away.

Cooked potatoes and anything made from them: cool them quickly (spread out, within 1 to 2 hours), keep them covered in the fridge, and eat them within 2 days. Reheat until steaming hot all the way through, and only once. (This is the general chilled-leftovers advice relayed by local-authority food-safety pages; there is no potato-specific rule, but potatoes are starchy, so they get the same care as rice and pasta.) Potato breads keep for 1 to 2 days in a bag, and freeze well sliced.

Checkpoint: can you do this now?

I can use dry mash to make a soft dough.
I can cook farls and lefse in a dry pan.
I can mix and shape a wet yeast dough like focaccia.
I know why potato makes bread stay soft.
I know not to use hot water on yeast.

Next chapter

Cooking Skills: Potatoes 2, chapter 3 is Dumplings: kopytka, pierogi, knödel and pan-fried pierogi with onions.